Kid behavior: stupid or crazy?

Oct 17 20:39 UTC 1995

Being around my kids and their friends as they were growing up, it 
occurred to me that if adults behaved the way children behave, they 
wouldn't be considered immature -- they'd be considered insane.  
Imagine the following scenarios: 

    You stop for ice cream with your friend, a schoolteacher.  The 
    weather is hot and her ice cream cone gets quite drippy.  She asks 
    if she can finish it in your car, and you say "Sorry, no, it's too 
    messy" -- whereupon she sits down on the ground and starts 
    screaming.  

    Later on, you're on the road again.  Your teacher friend and her 
    older brother, who is an accountant, are sitting in the back seat 
    passing the time by seeing who can be the first one to spot ten 
    cars of a certain make and model.  The contest gets progressively 
    more acrimonious, until finally they get into a fist fight over 
    who spotted the winning car (a Chevy Lumina) first.  

    Your dinner guests are a married couple who both work as design 
    engineers for General Motors.  The husband carefully and 
    laboriously makes a perfect pyramid out of his peas, then shouts 
    "I'm Godzilla!" and squashes the pyramid with his fist, sending 
    pea-parts flying in all directions.  His wife, not to be outdone, 
    puts two cherry-tomato halves over her eyes and shouts, "I'm 
    Mothra!"  Then she runs screaming to the bathroom when the acid in 
    the tomatoes gets under her eyelids.  

    While you're having lunch with your lawyer at a nice restaurant, 
    he tries to drink a container of chocolate milk out of two straws 
    by inserting one straw into each nostril, and sniffing hard.  The 
    chocolate milk shoots up his nose and down his trachea and into 
    his lungs, sending him into loud spasms of coughing and retching.

response 2 of 32:

Oct 19 15:11 UTC 1995

I love it!!!! I am trying hard to sit here at work in my open cubicle
and not laugh out loud, and it's very hard to remain "professional"!

response 4 of 32:

Apr 20 19:05 UTC 1996

I know a kid who stuck his finger in an electic pencil sharpeneer to see if
it would make his fingers sharp. No, but it did make them bleed!

But, this makes me think. We studied parenting styles in a child psych class
I took a semester ago. One style was called "permissive" was just that... the
parent felt it was best to have no limits for the kids. They thought this was
encouraging them to be creative and free, but studies proved that it only made
kids selfish, explosive when asked to do something they didn't want to do,
and usually poor students, since they didn't feel they had to do their
homework if they didn't want to.

I am seeing a lot of parents like this lately.  These are the kids I see
running around in restaurants, screaming in malls, going ballistic when mommy
won't buy them that toy the see on the shelf (I know ALL kids can act this
way at some point). But the thing is, mom and dad aren't correcting it. 
i know I'd snap in 5 seoconds if my kid was screaming in a restaurant.  I
don't advocate hitting kids, but what is up with parents not even telling he
kid "No"? 

There are two boys living down the street from us... well not boys, they're
17 and 20 I think. They throw trash in our yard (beer cans mainly), play their
radio so loud that we can hear it all through the house, and just overall make
life hell for the neighbors. They parents have been told of their kids'
actions but they just don't seem to care. I think it's a "boys will be boys"
attitude. How can parents just not care abou setting limits for their kids?

response 6 of 32:

Apr 23 23:33 UTC 1996

My mom was kinda restrictive on me... it wasn't until I was in high school
that I got to wear what I wanted to school (orm to be more specific, everthing
I wore had to be accordance with her). She still hates my hair and I tell her
she can complain all she wants, but I am wearing my hair like I want to.
If she had her way, my shoulder length hair wold be permed and BIG. Icck!

What I do hate is the idea of treating kids as if they are your possessions.
Bhuddist tradition says parents are more like innkeepers, and kids are
travelers who use the facilities then move on. I like that idea.

I just can't figure out WHY parents  led their kids run wild is all.

response 8 of 32:

Apr 24 13:30 UTC 1996

I recall the time I was sitting with a group in one of those
enchanted courtyards, in Toronto.  You've seen them, little
tea tables, lots of filtered light, flowers, and in this
particular garden spot a number of miniature orange trees
complete with little fragrant oranges.

At table closest to ours sat two women and a little child,
maybe three.  At one point the child got out of her chair,
went to the nearest orange tree (right next to her mother's
table) and proceeded to pick all of the little oranges within
her reach (a significant number).  I watched this as did the
two women at the child's table.

But when the child then moved to the next orange tree, the
one next to me, I watched just so long before leaning over
until I was at the child's eye level, maybe a foot away 
from her face, and said in a firm but quiet voice, "Don't
pick the oranges."

Well, the child froze, her face started quivering, and within
moments she was uncontrollably crying.  The mother (who heard
my comment) went nuts too.  "How dare you...  You have no right..."
and such.

I know, I should have maybe spoken first to the mother, or told the
waitstaff and left it to them.  Or said nothing. But I didn't and I
wouldn't, that's just me.  The mother was aware of what the child was
doing, she just didn't see her child's actions as inappropriate.  My
interjection didn't change her view of her child's actions.  The child's
reaction didn't change my take on the situation. 

Lunch went on.  But that other table emptied pretty quickly and
someone was going to have to pick up a whole lot of little oranges.

response 10 of 32:

Apr 24 15:37 UTC 1996

chelsea, I think you were right to speak to the child.  You might have
spoken more super-tactfully, but it's not the case that you *should*
have.  The child might still have cried, either because a stranger
spoke to her or because she felt ashamed.  And since the mother 
already knew what was happening but did nothing, she had no right
to expect that you appeal to her first.

response 12 of 32:

Apr 25 03:10 UTC 1996

I think it reflects one of the scariest messages in modern parenting;
1.mom is god
2.no one should question mom's parenting skills
3.mom must figure it out and carry it out all on her own

Yeah, right!  In most other times and cultures, it would be expected that
any woman of child-bearing age or older not only *could* speak to any
child, they *should* and *would*.  That means a)mom's not isolated- less
abuse and desperation b)mom can learn by observation or ask for help and
c)kids know that they are cared for, what the rules are, etc.

But when you've got people who may have unrealistic notions of child raising
or development, or be insecure about their knowledge and ability, they are
apt to get real huffy if they think you're butting in, implying that they
are less than perfectly competent.  Add to that the fear of "perverts", and
you'
re as likely to get glared at as thanked for speaking to a child.  I do'nt
like it, I tend toward "tag team parenting", but I'm part of a minority.

response 14 of 32:

Apr 25 10:32 UTC 1996

(This car *was* parked, not moving, right?)

response 18 of 32:

Apr 27 05:47 UTC 1996

I usually got the dirty looks when I was acting up. That usually stopped me.

response 20 of 32:

Apr 28 18:02 UTC 1996

True, Kami. I saw a 10 year old painter on TV and was blown away by how smart,
poised and talented she was, while at the same time revelling in childhood...
she told Dian Sawyer how she played with Barbies :)

response 22 of 32:

Dec 19 11:01 UTC 1997

Hmm.  I'd forgotten about this item.

Recently the hammered-dulcimer mailing list (one of them) has had a thread
on various rude/thoughtless/inconsiderate behavior by spectators, some
of them funny & others alarming.  Several have mentioned kids who come up
(sometimes while the instrument is being played, sometimes not) and do one
or more of the following: lean or push on the instrument (causing stand to
tip); hit or pluck strings; grab hammers; talk or scream in performer's
ear; pick up other instruments (guitar, banjo) sitting in stands & *walk
off with them*.  (Adults have also been reported as doing all of these.)
Those performers who have firmly told the kids not to do so have usually
had to deal with outraged parents.  I think the mildest reaction reported
has been on the lines of "Boy, you just don't like kids, do you?"
Certainly no luck in getting the parents to take responsibility for
the kids' behavior.

response 24 of 32:

Dec 20 17:10 UTC 1997

I thought I'd repost here a dulcimer-list posting that came through
this morning, responding to this thread.

> Date: Sat, 20 Dec 1997 06:57:57 -0600 (CST)
> To: hammered_dulcimers@fmp.com
> From: Linda Lowe Thompson <llt@internettport.net>
> Subject: RE: Annoyances at Concerts
> 
> At 05:14 AM 12/19/97 -0700, you wrote:
> >Ron wrote:
> >
> >>I agree.  Learning to behave correctly is as much a part of education as
> >>learning to read. 
> 
> LLT:  Okay, I'll bite.  I've raised 4 kids and the last 2 were twin boys.
> At concerts, as well as everywhere else, I don't demand of others more than
> I demanded of my own children.  I didn't hit them---MOST of the time I
> didn't even call them bad names (you have to make a FEW allowances for when
> they were 16 and had yet another 16 year old guy living with us, too!)  But,
> they always knew they weren't allowed to make a disturbance when others were
> performing (or in church, or whatever) and they always knew to leave others'
> instruments alone.  What did this take?  Years and years of mothering.  And,
> we didn't take them back someplace, whether it was a restaurant or theater
> or whatever, til they'd learned to behave.  I birthed those people.  I owed
> it to them to teach them how to live in society (while not suggesting they
> should kowtow to ANY authority, no matter how silly or depraved---they've
> found that was a part of German parenting in the decades leading up
> You-Know-Who.
>         At Winter Festival, in the first few years, we had signs out that
> made it clear that well-behaved children were welcome and free; badly
> behaved children would cost $1000 and be summarily executed...well, perhaps
> not those exact words, but you get the idea.
>         Yesterday Wesley and I were talking about a close relative and his
> wife and kids.  I;d love to have the parents come visit but don't want the
> kids inside my house, ever.  You owe it to your kids to make certain they
> don't become people who cause that kind of reaction and it needs to be done
> while they're really little and impressionable.  When they're 15 and in
> juvie, it's WAY too late!
> 
> Linda Lowe Thompson>